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BARON DE SAINT CASTIN 



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BARON DE SAINT CASTIN 



BY 



JOHN FRANCIS SPRAGUE 

Editor of Sprague^ s Jotirnal of Maine History 



PORTLAND, MAINE 

SMITH & SALE, PRINTERS 

191S 



Gift 
Author 

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The Bangor Historical Society and 
the Piscataquis Society held historical 
Field Days at Castine^ Maine^ July 

14-15^ 1915- 

The exercises commenced in the eve- 
ning of July 14^ in Emerson Memorial 
Town Hall, where an address of wel- 
come was made by Honorable W. A. 
Walker on behalf of the Castine Board 
of Trade, Responses were made by 
Honorable Henry Lord, President of 
the Bangor Society, and John Francis 
Sprague, President of the Piscataquis 
Society. Other speakers at these meet- 
ings Tvere Mr. Charles W. Noyes, of 
New York, Dr. George A. Wheeler^ 
and Mrs. Louise Wheeler Bartlett, of 
Castine, Honorable Frank E. Guern- 
sey, of Dover, Mr. Edward M. Bland- 
ing, and Dr. William C. Mason, of 
Bangor, and Professor Wa rren 
R. Moorehead, of Andover, Ma s s . 

Following is President Sprague^s 
response on this occasion. 



BARON JEAN VINCENT D'ABADDIE 
DE SAINT CASTIN 

RESPONSE BY MR. SPRAGUE 

Mr. Pi-esident, Metnbers of the Castine Board 
of Trade ^ and of the Historical Societies, 
Ladies and Gentlemen : 

Personally and especially in behalf of the 
Piscataquis Historical Societ3s I return to 
you and to the good people of old Castine 
our sincere thanks and appreciation of your 
hearty welcome and the many kindnesses 
and courtesies bestowed upon us to-day. 
This pleasant occasion will ever remain a 
sweet and agreeable memory in our minds 
through all of the future years. 

Castine, deriving its name from one of 
the most interesting and picturesque char- 
acters that the annals of the rise and fall of 
New France in the New World discloses, is 
assuredly a mecca for all who are inter- 
ested in the real story of the earliest 
Colonial life on the coast of Maine and who 



love its m3'Stery and its romance. We 
stand at this hour upon one of the most 
historic spots on the American continent. 
Here we may glance back through the vistas 
of time to that period when by wars and 
revolutions a new spirit of nationalism was 
awakening in both England and France ; 
when England was evolving from a com- 
munity of agriculturists to a great empire 
of makers and merchants ; when each was 
bursting through the narrow confines of 
mediaeval Europe. And this awakening in 
the Old World, in the sixteenth century, 
evolved a wonderful class of men, brave, 
defiant and far-seeing ; part statesmen and 
part pirates and wholly daring adventurers ; 
the forerunners of England's chartered 
stock companies which followed in the 
beginning of her commercial greatness. 
Historians have called this the Elizabethan 
age. In the last days of the sixteenth cen- 
tury France had emerged from thirty years 
of conflict and turmoil which was followed 
by the assassination of Henrj^ HI and the 
ascension to the throne of Henry IV, "the 



Knight of the White Plume," who for six- 
teen years had been King of Navarre. He 
became the rightful King in 1589, but it 
was not until 1594 that his seat was secure 
from the intrigues and armed attempts of 
his enemies to dethrone him. He was one 
of the greatest of European rulers of that 
age and although born a Protestant he later 
embraced the Catholic faith but believed 
fully in religious freedom. His cardinal 
principles of government were that France 
should maintain the hereditary rights of 
monarchy ; that the Catholics should be in 
the majority in his councils ; that there 
should be absolute peace between the Cath- 
olics and Protestants and complete religious 
liberty for both. And as a result of this 
we see him sending forth Champlain a 
Catholic and DeMonts a Protestant united 
as explorers and making the first American 
settlement on our Maine coast in Passama- 
quoddy Bay, June 24, 1604. 

A century had passed since Columbus 
had revealed America to the world. Com- 
merce stirring in France as in the whole of 



Europe was aroused from the sleep of 
feudalism. The ocean and its m3^steries 
began to fascinate the human mind and 
navigation was the attraction of the brave 
and ambitious. 

Henry the Fourth encouraged and fos- 
tered this spirit of adventure and desire to 
establish a new France in America and rival 
England in colonial enterprises. And for 
a century the coast of Maine was the scene 
of much of the great struggle that ensued 
between the Anglo Saxon and the Latin for 
supremacy in America. 

Historians have handed down to us some 
recorded facts regarding this land of St. 
Castin. But its prelude, its shrouded back- 
ground is Norumbega, ever appearing upon 
history's pages but never explained, never 
real yet always existing. Its fame attracted 
hardy and bold explorers, missionaries and 
adventurers, and its bewildering tales fas- 
cinated the European mind. It was a 
magnificent dream. An alluring phantom 
never chased to its lair. It was thewill-o'- 
the wisp of Maine's colonial history. And 



it was here on the banks of the ancient 
Pentagoet and in its vast forest wilds where 
fable and romance, more often than in any- 
other place, located the golden city with its 
wondrous walls of pearls, its riches and its 
splendor. That these marvelous tales aided 
greatly in stimlating emigration to America 
is indisputable. But those who followed 
the rays, of this Norumbega rainbow found 
only a coast of grandeur, the huts of sav- 
ages and wild forestry. And as we to-day 
sail down the grand old Penobscot, flowing 
from out the vast wilderness country 
around and beyond Chesuncook, and from 
its thousands of lakes and its legion of 
brooks and ponds making its way to the 
sea, we may not behold that city of wonder 
with its houses upheld by pillars of silver 
and crystal, or the "mountain of silver," 
or any of the glow of a barbaric splendor 
which lived in European imagination for 
more than fifty years during the sixteenth 
and seventeenth centuries. But we may 
know and fully realize that we are on ground 
made sacred by the footprints of Champ- 



lain and other early explorers, who were 
the fathers of American colonization. 

While w^e would pass with haste these 
rugged characters and d'Aulney and 
LaTour and their compeers, we fain would 
tarr}^ for a brief moment in a retrospect of 
Baron Jean Vincent D'Abaddie St. Castin, 
who made such a deep impress upon the times 
in which he lived and whose name is so 
indelibly interwoven with some of the most 
important events in our colonial history. 
It is not for us to know very much of his 
career. Accurate history, however, pre- 
sents him as a bold personage yet liberal 
and tolerant for the age in which he lived. 
He had no prejudice against the red men 
but affiliated with them and finally married 
a daughter of Madocawando, one of the 
noblest of the Indian chieftains of the 
Penobscot tribe. Maine's own poet, Long- 
fellow, one of the world's sweetest singers, 
loved the lore and the legends and tradi- 
tions of ancient Maine history. The trag- 
ed}^ of Father Rale, the Indian battles and 
his early memories of the woods, the rivers 

10 



and lakes and the sea coast and the bays 
of Maine, enthralled him. Nowhere upon 
the pages of American literature appears 
anything more delightful than his story in 
rhj'-me of the Baron St. Castin. He tells 
how this young man of noble family edu- 
cated and cultured left his baronial home 
in the beautiful country of the Pyrenees in 
sunny France, "And sailed across the west- 
ern seas," in quest of fortune and adventure 
in the New World of marvel and mystery. 
He draws the pathetic picture of "His 
father, lonely, old and gray" sitting alone 
by his fireside mourning the absence of his 
beloved son and longing for his return. 
We see the holy father of the church calling 
on the aged sire and offering him consola- 
tion : 



" Ah yes, dear friend ! in our young days 

We should have liked to hunt the deer 

All day amid those forest scenes, 

And to sleep in the tents of the Tarratines ; 

But now it is better sitting here 

Within four walls, and without the fear 

Of losing our hearts to Indian queens ; 

II 



For man is fire and woman is tow, 

And the Somebody comes and begins to blow." 



Then a fatal letter wings its way" and 
he learns that "the young Baron of St. 
Castin," 

" Swift as the wind is and as wild, 
Has married a dusky Tarratine, 
Has married Madocawando's child ! " 



"For many a year the old chateau lies 
tenantless and desolate" until one bright 
day the good Curate is seen speeding 
"along the woodland way" humming gayly 

" ' No day is so long 
But it comes at last to vesper -song.' 
He stops at the porter's lodge to say 
That at last the Baron of St. Castine 
Is coming home with his Indian queen, 
Is coming without a week's delay; 
And all the house must be swept and clean 
And all things set in good array I 
And the solemn porter shakes his head ; 
And the answer he makes is : " Lackaday ! 
' We will see, as the blind man said 1 ' " 

12 



With what feelings of fear and trepida- 
tion the father looked forward to the com- 
ing of the wild daughter of the dusky 
Penobscots ! He looked "to see a painted 
savage stride 



" Into the room, with shoulders bare, 

And eagle feathers in her hair, 

And around her a robe of panther's hide." 

" Instead, he beholds with secret shame 

A form of beauty undefined, 

A loveliness without a name, 

Not of degree, but more of kind ; 

Nor bold nor shy, nor short nor tall, 

But a new mingling of them all. 

Yes, beautiful beyond belief. 

Transfigured and transfused, he sees 

The lady of the Pyrenees, 

The daughter of the Indian chief. 

Beneath the shadow of her hair 

The gold-bronze color of the skin 

Seems lighted by a fire within. 

As when a burst of sunlight shines 

Beneath a sombre grove of pines, — 

A dusky splendor in the air. 

The two small hands, that now are pressed 

In his, seem made to be caressed, 



13 



They lie so warm and soft and still, 

Like birds half hidden in a nest, 

Trustful, and innocent of ill. 

And ah ! he cannot believe his ears 

When her melodious voice he hears 

Speaking his native Gascon tongue ; 

The words she utters seem to be 

Part of some poem of Goudouli, 

They are not spoken, they are sung! 

And the Baron smiles, and says, " You see, 

I told you but the simple truth ; 

Ah, you may trust the eyes of youth ! " 

"The Baron Castine of St. Castin" and 
his beautiful Indian queen are finally com- 
pletely welcomed at the old home and fire- 
side, but not until after they had been "wed 
as Christians wed," for the crude wedding 
which had united them on the banks of old 
Pentagoet, under the shade of the hemlock 
and fir, did not fully meet with the appro- 
bation of the church. 

"And things" with them finally came 
to a happy end." 

" The choir is singing the matin song, 
The doors of the church are opened wide, 

14 



The people crowd, and press, and throng 

To see the bridegroom and the bride. 

They enter and pass along the nave ; 

They stand upon the father's grave ; 

The bells are ringing soft and slow ; 

The living above and the dead below 

Give their blessing on one and twain ; 

The warm wind blows from the hills of Spain, 

The birds are building, the leaves are green, 

And Baron Castine of St. Castine 

Hath Come at last to his own again." 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



017 396 344 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




017 396 344 



